The secret court of appeals that hears review of lower FISA court decisions granting or denying wiretap and surveillance orders met for the first time ever yesterday .

The court met to review the lower court's decision "rejecting Attorney General John Ashcroft's request for expanded wiretap powers in espionage and terrorism cases."

The Attorney General says he has the new powers as a result of changes in the Patriot Act, which changes he interprets as providing that applications for surveillance warrants can have criminal investigative rather than intelligence gathering purposes as their principal goal.

This interpretation is contrary to the intent of Congress in passing the Patriot Act as we have previously argued in-depth here.

The three-judge secret appeals court has a name -- the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review--

As expected, it met in secret. No one knows if its findings also will be kept secret.

Thanks to Howard Bashman for providing the link to the Government's brief (it's redacted of course.)

Update: Here is the ACLU's Sept. 9 press release and Sept. 4 <a href="http://www.aclu.org/court/FISA_appeal_ltr.pdf" letter of protest, which was also signed by the Center for National Security Studies, the Center for Democracy and Technology, the Electronic Privacy Information Center and the Open Society Institute.

Hamster takes us today to Bill Berkowitz's column in Working for Change about the DEA Museum (yes there really is such a thing).

A new exhibit opens today called "Target America: Traffickers, Terrorists & You".

"Beginning September 10 - in time for the one year anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon - the DEA's Arlington, Va.-based Museum & Visitor's Center will present a new exhibit called "Target America: Traffickers, Terrorists & You." The new show will reflect the Bush Administration's recent anti-drug mantra that the "war on terrorism" is inextricably linked to the "war on drugs." "

'The "use drugs/support terrorism" campaign organized by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP, the office of the "Drug Czar"), was unveiled with a $3.5 million ad buy during this past February's Super Bowl."

The DEA's descriibes the new exhibit as tracing "...the historic and contemporary connections between global drug trafficking and terrorism. Starting with the horrific events of September 11, 2001 and moving back in time to the ancient Silk Road, this exhibit…will present the visitor with a global and historical overview of this deadly connection. The visitor will have many opportunities to explore the often-symbiotic relationships that exist between terrorist groups and drug trafficking cartels and the personal impact those connections have on the visitor."

"A recent press release from the California chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws noted that 'Since September 11, when the federal government promised to focus their resources on fighting terrorism, federal agents have raided medical cannabis buyers cooperatives in Los Angeles, Santa Rosa and San Francisco.' "

Berkowitz says "Steph Sherer, the executive director of Americans for Safe Access, which she describes as 'a network of patients, advocates and caregivers who defend patients' access to medical marijuana,' told me that 'There have been more arrests for medical marijuana cultivation and distribution since September 11, than there have been for any acts of terrorism in California.' "

Bruce Mirken of the Marijuana Policy Project tells Berkowitz, "The new exhibit appears to be a grotesque desecration of the memories of the people who were killed on September 11."

In response to the DEA exhibit, The Marijuana Policy Project has created a Web-only counter-exhibit called "Target America: The DEA and You."

The MPP exhibit "examines the deadly connection between the 'War on Drugs' and terrorism, the often-symbiotic relationship between drug warriors and terrorist drug cartels and the personal impact those relationships have on the average American."

"MPP focuses on the victims of the DEA - AIDS patients deprived of medicine, medical marijuana dispensaries raided and shut down, and stories about innocent people killed by the DEA and other 'Drug War' agencies. Each of the sections contains photos, graphics and extensive documentation. "

Final Merkin comment to Berkowitz: "The public is waking up to the futility and destructiveness of the so-called war on drugs....This exhibit's dishonest, hypocritical attempt to hitch the DEA's wagon to the popular effort against terrorism is a sign of how desperate they've become."

We agree. In light of the absurd raids on California medical marijuana farms, we think the DEA Project should be renamed "DEA Targets Sick and Dying Americans."

For more information about the DEA Museum & Visitor's Center: Phone: (202) 307-3463; Fax: (202) 307-8956; E-Mail: museumstaff@deamuseum.org; Web site: www.deamuseum.org.

For more on America's drug wars, see:

Marijuana Policy Project - www.mpp.org
Drug Policy Alliance - www.drugpolicy.org
Cannabis.com - www.cannabis.com
National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (California) - www.canorml.org
Americans for Safe Access - www.safeaccessnow.org
Californians for Compassionate Use - www.marijuana.org
DrugWar.com - www.drugwar.com

The New York Times makes some excellent points in today's editorial,The War on Civil Liberties.

"As the Bush administration continues down its path, the American people need to make clear that they have learned from history and will not allow their rights to be rolled back. The world has changed since Sept. 11, but the values this country was founded on have not. Fear is no guide to the Constitution. We must fight the enemies of freedom abroad without yielding to those at home."

In the first lawsuit of its kind, an Egyptian national seeks damages for being denied access to counsel and for his mistreatment by federal prison guards during two months of incarceration in Louisiana.

Arrested on Sept. 12, Hady Hassan Omar's "offense" was buying an airline ticket at the same Kinko's copying center as one of the 9/11 hijackers. He was released on Nov. 23, after it was determined he had no connection to terrorism. Married to a U.S. citizen, he was charged with overstaying his visa.

Omar's lawsuit alleges he was "subjected to numerous unnecessary body cavity searches, harassed and ridiculed by guards and was not allowed to pray or eat according to Islamic traditions. At one point... he was forced to urinate on himself because he was not able to use a bathroom."

Omar says the treatment he received over 73 days in detention amounted to torture. He is believed to be the first to formally accuse the Justice Department of maltreatment. His suit also names prison and immigration officials.

The Justice Department's new victimization survey is out. Highlights include:

The violent crime rate fell 10% 2000-2001, due primarily to a significant decrease in the rate of simple assault.

The overall property crime rate fell 6% between 2000-2001 because of decreases in theft and household burglary rates.

For the first year since the redesign of the NCVS in 1992, in 2001 males and females were victims of simple assault at similar rates.

Yesterday's Dallas Fort Worth Star-Telegram's detailed editorial Reflecting On Rights Lost In the Past Year is well-worth a read. (Thanks to Buzzflash for taking us there.)

We are with Maxspeak on this commentary expressing our feelings of dread over the upcoming media barrage on the September 11 attacks.

"What TV should be doing on Sept. 11, in my opinion, is spending a day reflecting on how we still haven't caught the evil monster behind the tragedy. I would replay over and over again President Bush's fight talks about how we were going to get bin Laden dead or alive and other stirring speeches from his administration about the game plan for bringing him to justice."

"Also needed is penetrating analysis on why, after spending billions, we have hundreds of people in jail here, but bin Laden and his al-Qaida cohorts presumably are alive and well somewhere in 60 countries. "

"As NBC's Fred Francis summed up the bafflement in the Big Hunt almost a year after Sept. 11, "The FBI still does not have a paper trail of those hijackers - how they were organized, who gave them their tactical orders." I hope we won't still be looking for him and the suicide-bomber militants for the second anniversary. "

Readers looking for a break from the 9/11 coverage are welcome here where we will be continuing to write about crime and injustice news and this Administration's excesses in the name of the "War on Terror."

A man who spent more than 15 years in prison before DNA tests exonerated him has filed a civil rights complaint against prosecutors and two former detectives who took his confession. Bruce Godschalk, 42, claims former Detectives Bruce Saville and Michael Karcewski coerced him into confessing to raping two women in 1986.

One of the prosecutors sued is protesting too loudly in our opinion.

"The lawsuit, filed last month, also accuses the Montgomery County District Attorney's office of refusing to release the DNA evidence that eventually cleared Godschalk and prompted his release in February. District Attorney Bruce L. Castor Jr. was not involved in the case at the beginning, but was in office during the struggle over releasing the DNA samples."

Castor, Jr. belongs in the suit because he is alleged to have played a role in blocking the DNA tests which proved Godschalk's innocence. If he didn't do it, a jury can so find. But to claim he shouldn't be sued at all over the allegation is plain wrong.

Here is more from the Innocence Project on the actions of prosecutors in the Godschalk case.

"Godschalk's appeals were denied. He contacted the Innocence Project in 1995, after his own motion for DNA testing was denied. The Innocence Project tried for years to obtain a copy of the taped confession, which the prosecution refused to provide until 1999. The tape was sent to an expert, who concluded that it was likely that Godschalk had falsely confessed. The analysis of the confession notwithstanding, the District Attorney refused to allow access to the biological evidence for testing."

"In November 2000, the Innocence Project and local counsel filed a Section 1983 civil rights complaint seeking access to the evidence. After the Federal District Court granted access to the evidence and the prosecution's motion to dismiss was denied, the District Attorney consented to release the evidence in the spring of 2001. Delays in setting a testing protocol and delivering the evidence led to the Innocence Project filing of a motion for summary judgement in June 2001. "

"In their response to this motion, the prosecution revealed that they had sent the relevant evidence to a laboratory and had it tested, without the knowledge or consent of the Innocence Project. Prosecutors reported that their laboratory had not been able to obtain results and, furthermore, represented that the evidence had been consumed in this secret testing. The District Attorney also included an affidavit from the police officer that had elicited the confession from Godschalk."

"Several of the "facts" represented in the District Attorney's motion were false. Though they claimed that all of the evidence from one of the crimes was sent to the laboratory, a carpet sample with semen was never received by the laboratory. The District Attorney's Office told the Court that the carpet sample was not introduced as evidence and was not significant to the case, though this sample originated from the home of the victim that could not identify Godschalk and was used at trial to tie him to the scene of the crime."

"The prosecution had entrusted the same police officer that had elicited Godschalk's confession with the delivery of the evidence to the laboratory. He had also been the investigating officer that had removed the carpet from the crime scene. The carpet sample resurfaced in October 2001."

"The evidence from both cases was tested at Forensic Science Associates in January 2002. Not only were profiles obtained from the evidence in both rapes, the male profiles matched, meaning that the same perpetrator committed both crimes. Bruce Godschalk was excluded. The District Attorney had their own laboratory perform testing."

"Despite the fact that their own laboratory obtained similar results from the evidence, the District Attorney's Office refused to release Godschalk from prison, citing possibly flawed testing in the face of the evidence, namely the confession and the identification. "

"Finally, on February 14, 2002, Bruce Godschalk was released. He has maintained not only his innocence, but that his confession was coerced and the details it contained were provided by the investigating officer, allegations supported by the test results. After fifteen years in prison and seven years of fighting for DNA testing, Bruce Godschalk has been exonerated and freed from prison. "

This is another reason to write and call your elected officials in Congress and have them pass the Innocence Protection Act now. It provides for DNA testing for these inmates, taking the decision out of the hands of prosecutors, some of whom are so self-righteous they block the tests, holding the innocence-determining process up for years.

We say let the jury decide about DA Castor, Jr.

The news that DNA testing has shown that the five black and hispanic youths convicted of the brutal 1989 rape of a white Central Park jogger were not the actual rapists has a black police officers' group calling for a new inquiry.

"The advocacy group questioned the manner in which the original confessions were obtained and the ability of those who initially prosecuted the case to investigate themselves. "

"We believe that because of the demand to bring someone to justice from this crime, we believe that there is a strong possibility that there may have been overzealous policing and overzealous prosecuting," said Lt. Eric Adams, a co-founder of the group, 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care"

The youths have served time and been released. Another youth, not charged in the original attack, has since confessed. Atrios/Eschaton and Body and Soul have some terrific comments on this outrage.

Update Sept. 11--Read the Village Voice article on this, Guilty Until Proven Innocent

Tomorrow the Hamster returns from vacation, we've missed him, not to mention the great articles he finds and his comments.

Atrios over on Eschaton has a post today about former S.C. Republican Congressman and House Impeachment Trial Manager Lindsey Graham who is now running for the senate seat being vacated by 99 year old Republican Strom Thurmond.

Back in June, we reported on the race, heartily endorsing his opponent, Alex Sanders. We still do.

Some heavyweight republicans, including Weston Adams, considered to be one of the founding members of the modern S.C. Republican party, are backing Sanders as well.

As to Graham's romantic life, the topic of much speculation on Eschaton today, we have no idea, but we reported in his comments section some stuff we found on Lexis.

Money is available through a class action settlement to inmates who were booked in the Los Angeles County Jail between April 23, 1996 and December 31, 2001, and were held past the date they were entitled to be released.

The website has claim forms and all necessary information.

There is $27 million available for disbursement. The deadline to apply for the money is Sept. 20 and apparently many of those entitled to partake don't know it. So help spread the word.